1. The ESPN brand means a great deal to consumers. ESPN symbolizes the media coverage of all different kinds of sports, with their first and most popular program being SportsCenter. They have expanded from the once small network into a very successful network with ABC. 2. The core benefit to ESPN is the accessibility to sports news, schedules and games; ultimately sports entertainment. The actual product is being able to not only can you catch the latest sports updates on television, they also have a website, magazine, radio station and mobile telephone application. They ensure that no matter where you are that you have access to up to date scores, schedules and sports news. The augmented product is being able to rely on ESPN to cover the important sporting events and keep up with all the different aspects of the sports industry. 3. I think that ESPN has strong brand equity. ESPN is able to capture the customer’s loyalty and preference with it easy access, expansions of brands, and availability outside of the home such as in airports and on airplane.

Its equity brand relates to its brand value. ESPN’s strong brand equity has allowed it to exist for a significant amount of time. Its connection with sports fan, quality of service, and its strong customer relationship indicates that its high brand equity leads to a strong brand value. 4. Here are some examples of Co-branding along with the benefits and risk: Co-Brand Benefit Risk

-Integrates with ABC. -Larger viewing audience. - Loss of fans due to added station. -ESPN on ABC - Access to different and more sporting Events. -Mobile ESPN - On the go access -Inability to breakeven after a year. -ESPN360.com -On demand video access -Possibility of not being profitable

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...COMPANY Case
ESPN: The Evolution of an Entertainment Brand
In the 2004 movie Anchorman character Ron Burgundy ( Will Ferrell) auditions for a position on SportsCenter with the very new and lit-tle known network, ESPN ( Entertainment and Sports Programming Network). The year was 1979. After pronouncing the name of the network “ Espen,” he then is shocked to find out that ESPN is a round- the- clock sports network. Through his laughter, he asserts that the concept is as ridiculous as a 24- hour cooking network or an all- music channel. “ Seriously,” he shouts. “ This thing is going to be a financial and cultural disaster. SportsCenter . . . that’s just dumb!”
While this comical sketch is fictitious, when a young college graduate named George Bodenheimer took a job in the mailroom at ESPN it 1981, it was for real. Today, Mr. Bodenheimer is president of the network that has become one of the biggest franchises in sports, not to mention one of the most successful and envied brands in the entertainment world. As a cable network, ESPN commands $ 2.91 from cable operators for each subscriber every month. Compare that to $ 1.67 for Fox Sports, 89 cents for TNT, and only 40 cents for CNN. The core ESPNchannel alone is currently in more than 96 million homes. With that kind of premium power, it’s...

...WITHOUT SPORTS CAMPAIGN
OVERVIEW
Beginning with its 1979 cable-television launch, ESPN, Inc. (then officially known as Entertainment and Sports Programming Network), strove to build a brand that was synonymous with sports. After progressively acquiring broadcasting rights to college basketball and football and then, one after another, to each of the major professional sports leagues, ESPN became the dominant sports network on television as well as a cable-industry model for success. Indeed, the proliferation of specifically targeted cable channels in the 1990s and 2000s owed a great deal to ESPN’s example of successfully targeting sports-obsessed men. At the same time, the wide selection of channels that became available to most consumers made it ever more imperative that networks offer a clear brand image. In late 2002 ESPN unveiled its first overall branding campaign, ‘‘Without Sports.’’
Created by the New York office of ad agency Wieden+Kennedy (W+K), the ‘‘Without Sports’’ television spots ran during ESPN’s own programming. The campaign attempted to reinforce the network’s brand image as the sports-fan’s lifeblood while simultaneously transcending the core audience of 18- to 34-year-old men to make the point that nearly everyone was, at bottom, a sports fan....

...Take Five Sports Bar and Grill has established a successful presence in the food and beverage service industry. The flagship location in suburban Anytown (Medlock Bridge) will gross in excess of $2 million in sales in its first year of operation, ending July 1996. First year operations will produce a net profit of $445,000. This will be generated from an investment of $625,000 in initial capital. Since 10 months of operations have already been completed the confidence level for final first year numbers is extremely high. The first 10 months of start-up costs, sales revenues, and operating expenses are actual.This restaurant industry is very large and sometimes hard to get exact numbers. There are many categories of restaurants so I outlined Services sector and the restaurant industry according to Yahoo finance. “The nation's 900,000 restaurants should hit $476 billion in sales in 2005, according to the National Restaurant Association's 2005 Restaurant Industry Forecast”. Restaurants employ12.2 million, this is 9% of the workforce in the United States, and the industry is the largest employer besides government. These numbers include single owner restaurants to the largest franchises in the world.
The growth trends for the restaurant industry are forecast to advance 4.9% in 2005. Analyst predict that the U.S. Restaurant Industry which created, on average, about 270,000 new jobs per year during the last 10 years is on track to add 1.8 million new jobs...

...
ESPN Biography
“If you’re a fan, if you’re a fan, what you will see in the next few minutes, hours, and days to follow may convince you that you’ve gone to sports heaven,” were the first words ever said on ESPN and they were said by George Grande on September 7th, 1979 when ESPN went live at 7 p.m. (Smith 11). Entertainment Sports Programming Network or more commonly known as ESPN is a pioneer among basic cable television networks because it was the first network to devote its entire programming to sports and it was created by a man name Bill Rasmussen in a small Connecticut town called Bristol. Outside ESPN’s headquarters in Bristol there is a simple small sign that reads “Welcome to ESPN” the sign is an important part of ESPN’s message to its people every day when they come to work, it’s about the fans and the sports, not ESPN (Smith 3). ESPN’s mission statement is as follows: “To serve sports fans wherever sports are watched, listened to, discussed, debated, read about or played” (espncarrers.com). ESPN had a rough start up and took a while to begin making a profit but ESPN grew into a network empire. I will give some history about ESPN, how significance ESPN is in our culture, and how ESPN helped change our media landscape....

...1. In a succinct manner, describe what the ESPN brand means to consumers.
ESPN stands for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network. To consumers the ESPN brand means quality sports entertainment. It is a way to provide to the sports need of consumers. It is easily accessible to extend its brand by reaching consumers through various methods such as television, radio, internet, and mobile. Through televison, ESPN was one of the first networks to break new in HDTV with simulcast service for ESPN and ESPN2 and it still maintains the most HD programming content and highest level of HD viewership in sports. SportsCenter was ESPN’s first program. SportsCenter is the only nightly, full-hour sports new program. In the past ESPN has rebroadcast taped episodes of SportsCenter during the day. Through radio, ESPN is the nation’s largest sports radio network. ESPN broadcasts syndicated sports talk shows, providing more than 9,000 hours of content annually to college and major league sports events. Through internet, ESPN.com is the leading sports Web site, boasting live streaming and 32 original podcasts each week. The rising star in ESPN’s online portfolio is ESPN360.com. Fans can also get exclusive content and sports video games....

...ESPN History
Flashback to before September 9th, 1979, all televised sporting events were on ABC, NBC, or CBS, and fans had to wait for the 5 o'clock or 10 o'clock or the next morning's paper to see other teams' highlights and scores of. That was the pre-ESPN era. Now, sports fans have unlimited access about sports anytime they want 24/7 in today's sports world dominated by ESPN. William Rasmussen was the mastermind behind the fresh edgy network that's broadcast to over half the countries in the world. Blossoming into a mini-media conglomeration in its own, ESPN has conquered of the so-called "Sports Nation" does not show any signs of slowing down anytime take over. In addition of being a subsidiary of Walt Disney Company, ESPN's colossal sweep of the United States and abroad can be attributed to its ambiguity to reach all markets in anyway possible, by development focusing on the sports fan, modernizing with the times, and the booming popularity of sports in general.
After being fired from his public relations job for Hartford Whalers, William Rasmussen employed his severance pay, which he used to buy a satellite transponder, his contacts in television, and a dream for a 24-hour cable network dedicated entirely to sports. That turned out to be all he needed to launch the network that would eventually broadcast to 87...

...angels
Evaluation:
Organisation:
My organisation skill went well; I made sure I showed up 15mintues before the session had started with all the equipment stetted out. This showed that I was ready to coach during and it was a sign of professionalism. Also made sure that every exercise changed on time so that participants weren’t getting and also leaving us to learn the exercise. For example during my session I taught the basic of punching first such the job, straight and hook. After learning we moved on to counter punching, which we spent more time because it’s more of a difficult exercise
Attitude of players:
The attitude of the boxer was really positive and showed that they had a knee interest of learning the sport. They would always be asking question on how to improve their technique to make them self’s a better boxer. However some did become a bit frustrated because they were struggling to follow throw technique, so I told them participants to slow it down and then we gradually learnt the technique and then applied it.
Performance of players:
The performance of most of the participants was below average but taking into term, it was pretty much there first ever boxing session so over their performance was great. So did stand out better than other because if their physical abilities and how they train their self’s outside of college. For the ones that were performing better than others, I made their session a bit more...

...ESPN – Case Questions
1. Describe ESPN’s business design (product-market breadth and depth). Identify and describe its assets distinctive capabilities.
2. Critically evaluate ESPN’s brand leveraging initiatives. In other words, how has the ESPN brand meaning evolved (broadened) through extending the brand into new categories? What are the benefits of product development through sub-branding (associating new brands/products with ESPN)? What are the potential risks for ESPN and its new brands pertaining to brand extensions?
3. Evaluate ESPN’s strategy for building strong brands. In other words, how have they built strong sub-brands and/or new brands?
4. Describe ESPN’s market targeting and positioning strategies in an era of media fragmentation, growth of media classes (e.g., the Internet) and market segmentation?
5. Discuss the advantages and challenges of ESPN’s cell phone venture.
Notes:
Positioning - the act of designing the company’s offerings and image so that it occupies a distinct and valued place in the target customer’s mind relative to competitive choices.”
Methods for Positioning:
Examples:
1. Attribute – Bounty paper towels – more absorbent than competitors
2. Price/Quality – Marriott (high-end), Fairfield Inn &amp; Suites (value brand by Marriott)
3. Use or application – Gatorade. The brand is used in association with sports or other depleting...